Amada was gently pressed back into her seat as a soft roar filled the cabin. She could see the back of the pilot's helmet and his fingers hovering over the control yoke as the ships computer made the correction burn.
"We're one minute out," the pilots voice announced over the intercom inside Amada's helmet.
The gentle roar suddenly cut off and Amada's body pressed up against the restraint harness holding her to the seat. She tried to twist her head to see out of the side port but with the bulky helmet all she managed was a glimpse of a vast expanse of stars. Sharp, short burst began to sound through the cabin and the expanse of stars began to shift as the shuttle reoriented itself.
"Ten meters... five... four... thee... contact!" The pilot announced.
The cabin gave a sharp jerk which was followed by mechanical ratcheting sounds for several seconds before silence returned.
"Good lock and seal," the pilot announced a moment later, "You're free to disembark."
"Thank you," Amada replied and was surprised at how calm her voice sounded.
"Sure thing, and... huh... yea, enjoy... I guess..." the pilot said inside Amada's helmet, his voice tinged with amusement and perhaps a tiny bit of disgust.
Amada ignored him and unbuckled her harness, her body gently floating free of the seat the moment it released. She kept her movements slow and deliberate and pulled herself over to the porthole to peer out. She quickly picked out the half dozen small human shuttles just like hers already attached to the hull of Covenant Station, but what drew her eye were the same number of Pct'ah ships docked next to each human shuttle.
The Pct'ah ships resembled streamlined teardrops of burnished chrome next to the rectangular cubes of the human shuttles with the myriad pieces of unidentifiable equipment attached to the skin of each of the small ships.
Amana stared at the closest Pct'ah ship that was only a few meters away before turning and carefully pushing towards the airlock.
Humanity's Diaspora began in 2183 with the discovery of the Egorkov Alexeev effect. Within a decade EA generators had thrust humanity hundreds of lightyears from Earth and a century later had allowed them to make contact with an alien species for the first time.
Amada cycled the airlock and routinely checked the telltale indicators to make sure the area beyond was pressurized before opening the outside hatch. The training for this encounter had been just as grueling as the bioengineering she had undergone, both taking two years to complete.
The initial encounters between humans and Pct'ah had gone remarkable well. The fact that Pct'ah, except for being extremely tal,l had a striking resemblance to humans with short cropped bristly hair that ran down the back of their necks to the small of their backs had probably gone a long way to smoothing over those encounters. It had quickly become apparent that humans and Pct'ah complemented each other, with human computer sciences, nanotechnology and biosciences far ahead of anything the Pct'ah possessed while Pct'ah mechanical engineering, the science and engineering behind the EA effect and understanding of chemistry for outstripped humans.
Amada pushed herself into the Covenant Station airlock and quickly cycled through. The room beyond paneled in gleaming white with recessed indirect lighting and a single vacsuite rack and storage locker next to a bench. A glass tube with a curved glass door took up one corner of the room, a zero G shower for after Amada's visit.
Amada stared at the shower for several long moments before the training that had been drilled into her took over and she began to remove her vacsuite and stow each piece of equipment properly on the rack.
Human and Pct'ah relations had flourished with a thriving trade between the two species, but with one point of contention that always frustrated humans. The concept of a contract or treaty seemed entirely foreign to the Pct'ah. No matter how earnest the negotiations, not matter how iron clad the contract the Pct'ah seemed to regard contracts as only guidelines or perhaps polite suggestions and not as legally binding rules.
Amada finished racking her vacsuite and glanced down at the thin form fitting blue uniform she wore. The uniform was elastic and molded to her body but also was a pain to remove in zero G. Amada ran a fingertip down the nearly invisible seam of the body suite from her neckline down between her ample D cup breasts to her hip, the nanobond releasing so that it unzipped without a sound.
It had taken longer for the zenopsychologists to piece together why Pct'ah didn't view contracts and treaties as binding than it had for the exobiologists to figure out why the Pct'ah resembled humans so closely. The reason had been simple. And rather shocking. An insurmountable brick wall that humans and Pct'ah could never surmount. Until humans figured out a way.
Amada struggled for a minute contorting her body into yoga poses never dreamed of in the zero G before finally managing to slip out of her uniform and stored it in the locker next to the bench. Amada stared at the flimsy garment, a single lonely item since she hadn't bothered to bring anything else with her. Her naked skin prickled in goosebumps at the soft caress of the air from the ventilation vents as well as her own trepidation. Finally Amada turned to face the one door that led out of the room and deeper into Covenant Station.
No matter how close Pct'ah and humans resembled each other physiologically, biologically they couldn't have been more dissimilar. Pct'ah possessed four hearts, a digestive tract that didn't bother with a stomach, a single bellows like cavity for lungs, even an organ that could store oxygen that allowed Pct'ah to survive underwater or in oxygenless environments, even in the vacuum of space for minutes at a time. But the most important difference between humans and Pct'ah for the zenopsychologists was that Pct'ah had three distinct sexes, male, female, and a thrall that carried a fertilized embryo to term after the male and female had impregnated it.
The door opened automatically for Amada as she drifted close, her hands finding the grab bars and propelling herself down the brightly lit hallway beyond. Amada felt the familiar thrill of flying as she drifted down the corridor before slowing when she reached the bright orange line and warning sign of 'WARNING ACCELARTION BEYOND THIS POINT'. Amada eased herself forward and quickly drifted down to the floor until she felt the soles of her bare feet meet the surprisingly warm deck just beyond the orange warning line. She stepped forward with a bounce, each step becoming heavier as she felt the weight of her breasts begin to pull at her chest. After six steps it felt as if she were strolling along a hallway in the Covenant Biosciences Center back on Luna although she had never strolled around naked.
The zenopsychologists learned that for Pct'ah the only truly binding way to seal a contact or treaty was through the use of a thrall to carry a Pct'ah child to term. A male and female Pct'ah from each side of the negotiating team and a neutral thrall would meet at the end of the negotiations, the progeny of that meeting the physical proof of the contract. And thus, the brick wall for humanity.
Amada sneezed as she approached the door at the end of the hallway, the musky smell of cinnamon and the not unpleasant smell of horses filling her nose, a hand slipping up to caress her breast and the hard point of her nipple that had nothing to do with the cool air. Amada reached out her hand to open that last door and then hesitated, her fingers shaking noticeably.
Humanity would always remain at a disadvantage when dealing with the Pct'ah without the ability to 'seal the deal', the Pct'ah incapable of understanding the concept of a legally binding contract without the physical proof of the progeny of the agreement. And so human bioengineers had set to work. The gross physical anatomy of humans and Pct'ah were already similar enough to be compatible if a bit uncomfortable for a female human so the scientists had set to work on the biological barriers of a human host for a Pct'ah child.
Amada hit the green icon with her fingers still shaking and the door slid open, the pungent smell of cinnamon and horses suddenly becoming overwhelming as she peered into the small circular room. The room itself was only three meters across, the floor a deep bowl roughly a meter deep. Amada's eyes were drawn to the two naked Pct'ah already standing inside the room, the female to Amada's left a bit short for a Pct'ah and close to Amada's own 189 centimeters with black bristly mane, the male standing in his given place to Amada's right truly a striking individual at 230 centimeters with a dark red bristly mane that covered his head and the back of his neckt to disappear down his back. The Pct'ah's bodies were hairless, their chests completely smooth without even nipples since Pct'ah thralls were the only ones to breastfeed. Amada's eyes were drawn down to stare at the swell of the Pct'ah's mounds and the crease of their sex that both males and females possessed and wondered if they were staring at her own.
The problem hadn't been as insurmountable as first feared since a Pct'ah thrall only hosted a child, the genetic contribution coming from the female egg and male sperm implanted in the thrall's body. After years of research advances in bioengineering and nanotechnology allowed scientists to modify human female volunteers to be able to carry a Pct'ah child to term. An artificial thrall. The Pct'ah had been both amazed and ecstatic since thrall births were much rarer than male and female Pct'ah children, as little as one thrall in a hundred births. The possibility of having human women host Pct'ah children would allow the Pct'ah to increase their numbers beyond anything they had ever hoped to achieve.
Amada stepped inside and glanced down at the floor in surprise when her bare feet sank into the warm spongy surface.
"I am Wal," the Pct'ah to Amada's left who would be the female said after the door behind Amada had closed.
"I am Orth," the tall Pct'ah on Amada's right added in the ritual response, his position to Amada's right declaring him to be male.
"I am Amada," Amada replied and then completed the ritual greeting as she had been trained to do, "I come willingly to you today to serve as your receptacle, to seal our bond with the gift of a future generation."
"We accept you as worthy," both Wal and Orth said in unison before walking slowly down to the bottom of the bowl.
Amada's heart hammered in her chest as she matched Wal and Orth step for step. The musky smell of cinnamon and horses increased the closer Amada came to the Pct'ah, her eyes drawn to the thighs of both Wal and Orth as a thick white cream began to pump from their bodies to run down the inside of their legs. Amada's eyes widened and she felt an instant of nervous trepidation rush through her when she saw the tip of Wal's phallus slip out of the crease of her sex to begin waving through the air hungrily.
Amada couldn't help but stare. She had seen hundreds of pictures of Pct'ah phalluses, had been given a Pct'ah phallus dildo to play with and become accustomed to the shape and the feel, but seeing Wal's purplish red raw phallus covered in the thick white cream that was still pooring profusely out of her body, seeing how mobile the tip was or the dozens of phalanges writing around the tip like tiny mobile fingers where a human males glans would be was different. Amada felt her mouth water at the sight of the thick, viscous cream weeping from the flesh of Val's phallus. Unlike human penises, Pct'ah phalluses were much more primal and animalistic without a skin covering the shaft since they were normally retracted inside of a Pct'ah's body.
Amada licked her lips while staring at Wal's phallus as a few more centimeters slipped out. She could feel the gentle burn of her own arousal, could feel her own juices already flowing in anticipation of what was to come, but could never hope to match the amount of cream pouring from both Wal and Orth's bodies.
